OAKLAND -- The day after Houston Astros manager Bo Porter had plenty to say about A's shortstop Jed Lowrie bunting with his team leading 7-0, Porter had little to say about the incident Saturday.

"I'm going to say the same thing I said (Friday) night: nothing happened yesterday," Porter said before Saturday's game.

Porter apparently took umbrage with Lowrie bunting, presumably because the A's had such a sizable lead. Hence, reliever Paul Clemens threw at Lowrie on back-to-back pitches in the third inning.

After Lowrie flew out to end the inning, Porter rushed out of the dugout to confront Lowrie near the first-base line.

"I don't understand the reaction," Lowrie said Saturday. "He just blew his top. For him to run on the field like that, point at me and yell at me like that. I don't get that.

"If you're going to give up, OK. If you have plans of scoring runs, we're going to try to score as many runs as we can."

Athletics manager Bob Melvin said he expects both teams to move past the incident without there being any residual effect.

At the same time, Melvin said, he can see where Porter might have taken exception with Lowrie bunting.

"I can understand, they're down 7-0 and if I'm on the other side, maybe it perturbs me a little bit," Melvin said. "But it's still the first inning. So, that one's probably the in between, where you understand both sides of that."

Advertisement

The Astros placed a shift on Lowrie in the first inning, playing Lowrie to pull the ball to the right side.

Lowrie bunted toward third base, where Clemens fielded the ball and threw in time to get Lowrie at first.

"It's the first inning, you're playing a shift. Isn't that what you're asking me to do by doing that?" Lowrie said. "So, I didn't understand the reaction."

Oakland second baseman Eric Sogard said he and his teammates constantly walk a fine line between what's considered acceptable and what is deemed as a no-no.

"It's kind of that weird unwritten rule where you don't really know where the line is," Sogard said. "Especially that early in the game, it's tough to tell. I guess people feel differently about that. But now we can go back to playing ball."